Monday, March 30, 2009

Supreme Court Won't Hear Spam Case

The Supreme Court said Monday it will not consider restoring Virginia's anti-spam law, which is one of the nation's most aggressive state statutes aimed at banning unsolicited e-mail. The high court's decision to reject the case leaves in place a ruling by the Virginia Supreme Court that the law was unconstitutional because it prohibited political, religious and other messages in addition to commercial solicitations. Virginia was the only state to ban noncommercial bulk e-mail. State Attorney General Bill Mims said he plans to draft legislation in the next General Assembly session that addresses constitutional concerns posed by the spam law.

The Supreme Court's decision ensures the reversal of the conviction of Jeremy Jaynes, who in 2004 became the first person ever convicted of a felony for sending spam without allegations of any accompanying illegal conduct. Under a variety of aliases, Jaynes was accused of using T1 Internet connections to send hundreds of thousands of e-mails per day, using e-mail lists later reported stolen from AOL and eBay, among others. He was sentenced to nine years in jail but is serving time in federal prison on an unrelated conviction for securities fraud.

U.S. Internet Service Provider Association Executive Director Kate Dean said her group was disappointed the court chose not to hear the case. "While we believe the lower court's ruling to be flawed, the absence of a Virginia state law does not permit criminals to use ISPs' networks to transmit unsolicited commercial e-mail," she said. The Criminal Justice Legal Foundation's Kent Scheidegger was also displeased. "The premise that this law prevents people from sending e-mails without revealing their identity is wrong," he said. Both U.S. ISPA and Scheidegger's group filed friend-of-the-court briefs in the case.